Jan 03, 2014

Five Drucker-Like Business Moves of 2013

With book titles such as Managing for the Future and Managing in the Next Society, Peter Drucker was very much about looking ahead. Nonetheless, before 2013 fades too far into the rearview mirror, we thought we’d take a quick glance backward by highlighting five business moves from last year that were especially Drucker-like:

2. The continuing rise of BuzzFeed. Journalists may have reasons to lament turning everything in the news into lists, like “The 20 Most Unforgivable Twitter Spelling Mistakes of the Year” (or this list, for that matter). But the news site BuzzFeed, which uses such an approach, has hired investigative reporters and keeps on growing. As Wired explains, “The data-science team uses machine learning to predict which stories might spread; the design team keeps iterating the user interface through A/B testing and analytics.” BuzzFeed lives up to Drucker’s dictum (which we’ve discussed) that companies must go to customers systematically and find out what they consider to be of value.

3. The exhortation from Elon Musk to launch more non-Internet startups. In an interview earlier this year, Tesla Motors and SpaceX founder Elon Musk had a suggestion: “I recommend that people consider arenas outside of the Internet because there’s a lot of industries that could use that entrepreneurial talent and the skills that people have learned in creating those companies.” Indeed, Drucker similarly had admiration for innovations that tackled society’s biggest challenges: “Knowledge has to aim high to produce results. The goal has to be ambitious.”

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"In order to make the right decisions, people need to start asking the questions that really matter." https://t.co/1wAC3pljdrRT @rstraub46: Very important discussion on short-termism following @HillaryClinton denouncing quarterly Capitalism. @inclusivecap https:/…RT @RWartzman: In today's world, "the best way to retain customers is to set them free." http://t.co/fLWy632G0t @McKinsey